


Better than Good

by peterparkr



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, I couldn't stop thinking about it so I wrote this, Spider-Man: Far From Home (Movie), Spider-Man: Far From Home (Movie) Spoilers, it really hurt me, kind of, that scene on the plane with Happy and Peter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-03 17:58:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19469179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peterparkr/pseuds/peterparkr
Summary: Happy thought he’d have to show Peter how to make the suit.





	Better than Good

**Author's Note:**

> ~SPOILERS FOR FAR FROM HOME~
> 
> I wrote this as soon as I got home from seeing the movie. It didn't make me cry as much as I thought it would actually but this scene got me! I hope you enjoy :)

Happy thought he’d have to show Peter how to make the suit. He’d been left detailed instructions about it. Very detailed—with scathing cuts at his intelligence that were just so _Tony_ that he had cried when he first read them. 

Actually, everything about the notes from Tony makes Happy cry. They should be a gift really—a little slice of the genius’ mind meant just for him. But, he hates to think about Tony writing them. There are so many. Folder after folder, filled with file after file, filled with page after page. Happy knows that at least Pepper and Rhodey received their own versions. There is no way that Tony completed them all in the limited time between cracking time travel and the battle. He must have spent hours on them over the years, probably starting after the palladium poisoning incident, forming contingencies for every possible situation that he could imagine. 

Happy doesn’t like to picture his friend planning for After. The image it conjures makes his stomach twist unpleasantly—Tony alone in a barely lit lab in the middle of the night, envisioning his own death: leaving his family, friends, the world behind. But Tony was a futurist after all. He was always a few steps ahead.

It turns out that the instructions for making suits aren’t necessary. Peter takes one look at the holograms and starts building, like he’d done it countless times before. Maybe he had. Peter was no stranger to Tony’s labs pre-blip. Happy sometimes forgets that. It seems like so long ago, now. He would give almost anything to go back.

Peter turns away slightly as he begins and the sight knocks the air out of Happy’s lungs. All he can do is stare. 

It takes him back to the first time he watched Tony work. They hadn’t really been friends yet then, but Happy had been an overbearing bodyguard eager to prove himself. He’d irritated Tony into unlocking the lab door pretty quickly. Tony had low tolerance for annoyances, especially way back then.

It had been mesmerizing to watch him work. Tony had barely looked up at Happy as JARVIS let him in. He didn’t spare him a second glance or even a single word for the first few hours, just occasionally asked his AI a question or berated Dum-E for getting in the way. He was a force to be reckoned with, whirling around the room in an almost fevered haze. It was clear that he wouldn’t quit until his project was completed to perfection. Nobody, least of all Happy, could have stopped him if they tried, even as the night turned into early morning.

Sometime before the sun came up, Tony noticed Happy in his peripheral vision. His eyes had widened almost imperceptibly. Happy expected his boss to say something, but Tony quickly refocused on his work instead. For the next stretch of time, however, the man occasionally glanced in his direction. Happy hadn’t known Tony well at that point, but he guessed that there was some surprise in those looks. Finally, after the fifth or sixth time, Tony spoke.

“Are you still here? Did you forget the way to the door?”

“Just doing my job, boss,” Happy had shrugged. 

Tony’s mouth straightened into something that Happy interpreted as disappointment, but any traces of surprise were gone. “Right, well, you’re dismissed. Door’s about ten steps to your right.”

Tony had spun hastily in his chair and hunkered down over whatever he was tinkering with. Happy remained steadfastly in his seat, studying the outline of Tony’s body in the dim light. Only Tony’s desk was illuminated, but he looked tense, on the defensive.

Tony heaved an exaggerated sigh. “I’m not hearing a door opening, what’s the matter, guy?”

“My next shift starts soon anyway. This is as good a place as any to wait—you’re not bad company.”

Tony snorted but didn’t look up from his work. If anything, his hands started flying faster. Happy imagined the neurons in his brain firing rapidly. 

Enough time passed that Happy realized their conversation had ended. He noted with some satisfaction that Tony’s shoulders were no longer hitched up to his ears, his posture minutely more relaxed. 

It isn’t Tony in front of him now—the build is different, the hair color. But the energy, the precise movements and total absorption in the work as he builds, that’s the same.

Happy’s throat starts to swell in that particular way; tears threaten to fill his eyes. He hadn’t always been the biggest fan of the kid (he wishes he had done better at the start), but damn if he isn’t proud of him now. Tony would be too. 

“You’ve got the suit, then.” It manages to sound normal, not shaky like Happy thought it might. “I’ve got the music.”

He wanders to the front of the plane, lets his hands skim through the song library. Tony had always loved to put on a show while he worked, even if he was the only one there, _especially_ when he was the only one there. Happy had walked in on him many times—when Tony had been absentmindedly pumping a fist to the beat or presenting boisterously to the bots around him. Happy usually snuck back out the door before the boss could notice him. The lab was Tony’s space. To the outside eye, Tony Stark, Iron Man, had been king of the world. But, that was more of a facade than Tony admitted, even to himself. Those close to him knew that there were few places where the man felt completely comfortable—where he could let down the mask. 

That same sense of calm floods over Peter’s expression now.

Happy plays the song.

_Back in black,_  
_I hit the sack,_  
_I’ve been too long, I’m glad to be back,_

“I love Led Zeppelin!” Peter calls, thankfully sounding much cheerier than he had when he boarded the plane.

Happy can’t contain a small, fond smile at the words. He ignores the part of his brain that will always be Tony Stark— _Zeppelin, Hogan? Seriously? He’s a lost cause, we’ve failed our youth_ —and elects to let it slide, just this once.

He leans against the wall of the jet, content to watch Peter swipe this way and that at the hologram in front of him. His brain seems to be playing tricks on him, the person before him flickers between Peter and Tony. Peter sways slightly and bops his head to the beat. Tony shoves one fist in the air and thrusts his hips around.

Happy reaches for his StarkPad and navigates to Tony’s files. He scans through folders labeled “Project Get Happy Hogan Laid”, “Miss Maguna”, “My Fair CEO” and taps on the one called “Keep Spiderling Alive”. His fingers automatically scroll to the bottom.

 _Remember_ , the last line reads, _don’t let the kid do anything I would do._

His eyes shift up. Peter’s whisper-singing the words of the song under his breath as he works, his lips slightly turned up at the edges. Happy glances back down at the screen and reads the line one more time. Tony had always thought the worst of himself and sometimes, so had the world. But, Happy had seen all of it—the good, the bad and shockingly, the worse than bad. The man truly had been a mess after all. But at the core of Tony there was something that Happy had always deemed to be better than good.

Happy draws a red line through Tony’s sentence, makes a quick note off to the side. He looks up once more, sees that innovative passion in Peter's eyes. Maybe there are some exceptions to that rule.

**Author's Note:**

> I'd love for you to check out [this story!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19288219)
> 
> Come talk to me on [tumblr](https://peterparkrr.tumblr.com) (I'm new!)


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